


In Which Grif Accidentally Does Everyone a Favor, Actually

by ElricLawliet



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Gen, MERRY DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS MY COMPUTER IS WORKING AGAIN, PROTECT THEM, RvB Secret Santa, gift giving and christmas fluff, kids are just happy and grateful to be alive, the lieutenants just love their captains so much
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-26
Updated: 2016-12-26
Packaged: 2018-09-12 12:12:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9071098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElricLawliet/pseuds/ElricLawliet
Summary: Four months later and Grif reminds everyone that there's a certain feast-and-gift-centric holiday that they should totally celebrate now that planet-wide genocide isn't looming over their heads. The Lieutenants are all for it.





	

**Author's Note:**

> My only slightly late RvB Secret Santa gift for BlueLikeChurch! I was given the prompt of "LOTS AND LOTS OF FLUFF" essentially. It took me a bit to put this together, but I'm pretty happy. c:
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

In the aftermath of everything, it was so easy to forget that things like universal holidays existed. Many of the people of Chorus had lived life on the war-torn planet so long that they didn't even know holidays like Christmas and Halloween outside of stories.

Another thing to thank the Reds and Blues for, it seemed.

Because Grif adamantly refused to skip any holiday that typically called for a feast, and Christmas was absolutely no exception. For a man whose internal clock bled days and weeks together so continuously, the man had a terrifying radar for days that called for food.

And so it was by his insistence that New Armonia was in its current state, decked grandly out in...vines, lit signal flares, and traffic cones painted green.

Okay, so there was a tragic shortage of capitalistic holiday paraphernalia on a post-civil war ravaged fringe planet. The point is that they were _trying_ , okay?

And Palomo could respect a good try. He'd helped decorate this block after all, and after a try-well-done he was more than ready to get back to his room (not a bunk anymore, he had an actual _room_ in an actual mostly-completed _apartment_ ) and finish putting together that...project of his.

He grinned, wrapping the leftover vines around his shoulders and neck and practically skipping down the sidewalk.

  
  


\- - -

  
  


Jensen hummed under her breath as she left the mechanic shop, a song she was _pretty_ sure was a christmas carol, though she might be imagining some of the lyrics wrong. But it was the thought that counted anyway, right?

And she'd already put a lot of thought into what she was doing, so she only had so much more thought to put into the tune of a song, because the idea of songs was cool and all but she had things to do and stuff to work on, and only so much time before it had to be finished. She could _not_ mess up the first Christmas she'd ever celebrated, and certainly not by making herself in front of the best commanding officer she could ever hope to have.

Everything had to be absolutely perfect. And it would be, she knew it would. She'd put her heart and soul (and a fair bit of blood, unfortunately—recreational construction was apparently somewhat different than practical repair) into this, and she was almost done. Just a little bit more and it would be perfect, and she could not wait to see the look on her Captain's face when he saw the finished project.

Or at least, that was what she would vehemently continue to tell herself until it was too late to talk herself out of it. Because sometimes that was just what a girl had to do.

Either way, it was happening. And neither carol nor creeping self-doubt would stop her.

With an extra spring in her step and a merry maybe-carol under her breath, she headed back to the garage she and Red Squad girls had taken to running to finish the job.

  
  


\- - -

  
  


Bitters wasn't really a holiday kinda guy. Even before he'd become a soldier, the idea and stories of times like Christmas and and Hanukkah and all that had seemed like a bit too much work. The decorating, the preparing, the coming up with and obtaining gifts. Way too much prep for one 24 hour Earth day, if you asked him. And Chorus days were only 21 hours anyway!

Sure, Captain Grif had brought up the idea for the food, but the whole planet seemed to be more than eager and open to barreling right through the whole nine yards of over-activity. Which was ridiculous, because they didn't even actually have the materials to do that? They'd gone to the jungle and pulled vines from the trees because garland wasn't a thing here. And painted traffic cones green and poked holes in the rubber to hang ornaments, because pine trees _also_ weren't a thing here. He didn't really see why they couldn't have just made a fuck ton of food, because everyone knew that was what Grif had been hoping for and getting at when he suggested the thing.

...Though, he supposed he couldn't complain about everything. He hadn't seen Matthews this genuinely happy in years, or...anyone else, really. Even Palomo, who somehow always had that stupid genuine smile on his face, seemed to be even happier than normal.

So, maybe he owed his captain for that. And the whole helping save his life and planet thing, but really he'd been eating up the praise for that for about four months now, and it was high time to move on to some other reason of gratitude.

And so now here he was, utilizing the bullshit infiltration skills he'd been taught and digging through the supply crates from the UN's newest supply shipment. There was a lot more crates than he'd been expecting, and no clear method of organization.

The fuckface better appreciate the effort he was putting into this.

With a quiet grumble he pried open another crate--

Ah yes. Jackpot. Fucking _finally._

He reached in, grabbing a box and tearing it open, carefully pulling out one of its contents and tucking it into his pocket. With a smirk, he turned to high-tail it out of the bunker.

Mission complete. Now, he just had to wait.

  
  


\- - -

  
  


Smith smiled as he stepped into his apartment, smiling as he pulled off his armor and changed into his civvies. After another wonderfully fulfilling day of helping direct the reconstruction and relocation efforts (and also saving Palomo, who had earlier somehow managed to get a bunch of vines tangled around his neck and hooked on the railing of the apartment staircase; nearly strangling himself), it was finally time to head down the newly relocated Red Base for the planned Christmas party that his Captain had so brilliantly suggested.

Beaming, he picked up the carefully wrapped present from the coffee table and headed out and back down the stairs. There was a honk as he approached the bottom, and he exited the building to find a jeep, thankfully driven by Bitters, waiting on the curb. Palomo waved cheerfully as Smith grinned and jumped into the back next to Jensen.

“About time,” Bitters huffed as he immediately pulled out and sped off. “You know I figured you of all people would be the one that was ready to go early. Since when would you put off like, wrapping presents or whatever took so long?”

“My present has been ready for two days. I didn't realize I kept you waiting,” John said with an apologetic smile.

“Ignore him, we were waiting for like, two whole minutes,” Jensen snickered. “He's just mad because Palomo saw his present and started talking about how he _totally knew_ he was a nice guy this whole time.”

“Fuck you.”

Andersmith laughed. “I presume that means we all had the same idea then?”

“If by that you mean we all got our captains presents, then yeah that's kinda exactly what happened.”

They pulled up to the base, climbing out and carrying a package under their arm. They headed inside, finding the rec room easily and Palomo barging in ahead in front of the rest.

“KNOCK KNOCK!! There's no door here so I'm knocking with my mouth but hi we're here!”

A rainbow of heads out of armor looked up, Tucker with his eyes closed and seemingly making an active effort to not straight up strangle his lieutenant.

“Goddammit, Palomo.”

“I hope we didn't keep you waiting for too long,” Smith said, stepping in with the others and smiling warmly. “I apparently took longer dressing than I thought.”

“You ain't late,” Sarge said. “We been waiting for you to open the presents! We're doing that before eating, so that we can cause Grif maximum suffering!”

“I really do hate you, you know,” Grif tossed out casually.

“Then we're just in time!” Smith said, holding up his box. Caboose gasped, bouncing eagerly at his spot on the floor.

“Presents!!!! You brought us presents, you are just the BEST EVER!!”

Smith beamed even wider, crossing the room in two strides to place his present on the top of the generous pile stacked in Caboose's lap.

“Thank you, Captain! I hope you like it as much as I thought you would!”

Without so much as a by-your-leave Caboose grabbed the box, tearing of the paper and ripping open the box. He squealed, entire body wiggling with unrestrained joy as he held the gun maintainence kit above his head.

“SMITH! It is perfect!! Now I can brush Freckle's fur, and take him to dog shows, and he will be the PRETTIEST PUPPY EVER!! Aw oh Andersmith you are just, the best gift-giver _ever_!”

“ _Affirmative.”_

Smith beamed, ducking his head and glowing at the praise.

“Thank you, Captain! I'm so glad you like it!”

“So I uh, guess this means we're opening the lieutenants' presents first?” Simmons asked, as Jensen handed him her box.

“Looks like it,” Grif snorted, glancing up at Bitters. It didn't look like he was carrying a box, though it wouldn't surprise him if a maverick like him just hadn't bothered to--

And then he was hit in the face by a plastic-wrapped bundle. He sputtered a bit as it fell into hands.

“The fuck is--...oh my God.”

“Eyup,” Bitters grumbled, not looking at him. “There you go. Made it up to you or whatever.”

“Oh my _God_.” Grif actually sounded near tears, and he held the Little Debby jelly cream pie up to the light as though checking for authenticity.

“Kinda wish I could have found one as actually poisonous as the one I had to eat, but whatever, next best thing. Anyway, thanks for like--”

And he was cut off as Grif pulled him into a bone-crushing hug, squeezing the air right out of him and sobbing into his shoulder.

“Can someone please get him off of me?!”

He was ignored in favor of Simmons accepting his gift from Jensen, carefully unwrapping it. His jaw dropped.

“Th-this is...!”

“A perfect hundredth scale model of the first Warthog you taught me how to repair!!” she said eagerly. “Fully functioning too, if you could build a tiny enough robot to drive it. It has all six pedals and everything! And it—o-oh gosh, are you crying?”

“No,” Simmons sobbed, carefully setting the model car down and burying his face into his hands.

Jensen fretted around a bit, awkwardly patting his back and comforting him as Tucker sighed, staring warily at Palomo.

“Alright kid, let's see it. What sort of cringe-fest did ya bring me?”

“I knew you'd be excited!” the green lieutenant said giddily.

He held out the box, messily wrapped in what looked like it might have once been pages of a...questionable magazine. Tucker could at least appreciate the paper, if nothing else. Tucker took it with a roll of his eyes, pulling the paper off and opening it.

Raising an eyebrow, he pulled out a book with thick pages and a plastic cover, so clearly homemade that it was almost funny. He flipped through it, blinking a bit.

It was full of pictures, pictures of him and Palomo and the others and their squads as well. Most seemed to have been pulled from the ever embarrassing Felix Mock Assassination Attempt Highlight Reel, but there were a couple that weren't. Snaps of them laughing at the canteen over lunch, a few of the less disastrous lesson attempts. He stared up at Palomo.

“Uh...what's this?”

“It's a scrapbook!” he said eagerly. “Before I became a rebel and the war and stuff, I kinda wanted to be a photographer! And I mean I didn't have a camera but my helmet did come with an image save thing? And sometimes I took pictures. You know, of the fun times! So that when stuff got really bad I could think of those! But the war is over, and I don't need them now, so I figured...well, you guys are probably gonna leave soon. And probably won't come back for a while. So I thought, hey! I can give him this! You know, to remember us by!”

Everyone had gone kind of quiet now, watching them. Tucker swallowed around the sudden itch in his throat.

“That... is the cheesiest fucking thing I've _ever_ heard, dude.”

He set the book down carefully on the table, yanking Palomo into a headlock and rubbing his fist against his hair.

Palomo grinned, laughing proudly as he tried to free himself. He knew he'd love it!

And later, if anyone saw Tucker carefully tuck the scrapbook into his coat, two hours later when dinner was done and everyone was ready to leave, bags of new presents in hand; they didn't say anything. Tucker wouldn't say anything either, way _way_ later when they were long gone back home and he occasionally came back to his bunk to find the thick book missing from the dresser. It always ended up back eventually, anyway.

Wasn't that big a deal.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Christmas, you dirty Blue you!
> 
> Also please look at the pic i got for it it's so _beautiful_


End file.
